Skip this Advertisement

A-Z Browse

  • Paris Observatory (observatory, Paris, France)
    national astronomical observatory of France, under the direction of the Academy of Sciences. It was founded by Louis XIV at the instigation of J.-B. Colbert, and construction at the site in Paris began in 1667. Gian Domenico Cassini was the first of four generations of his family to hold the post of director of the observatory....
  • Paris Olympic Games (1924)
    The 1924 Games represented a coming of age for the Olympics. Held in Paris in tribute to the baron de Coubertin, the retiring president of the IOC and founder of the Olympic movement, the Games featured a high calibre of competition. International federations had gained more influence over their respective sports, standardizing the rules of competition, and national Olympic organizations in......
  • Paris Olympic Games (1900)
    The second modern Olympic competition was relegated to a sideshow of the World Exhibition, which was being held in Paris in the summer of 1900. Pierre, baron de Coubertin, founder of the modern Olympics and president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), lost control of his hometown Games to the French government. The Games suffered from poor organization and marketing, with events......
  • Paris Opéra (French opera company)
    opera company in Paris that for more than two centuries was the chief performer of serious operas and musical dramas in the French language. It is one of the most venerable operatic institutions in the world....
  • Paris Opéra Ballet (French ballet company)
    ballet company established in France in 1661 by Louis XIV as the Royal Academy of Dance (Académie Royale de Danse) and amalgamated with the Royal Academy of Music in 1672. As part of the Théâtre National de l’Opéra, the company dominated European theatrical dance of the 18th and early 19th centuries. Its artists developed the basic techniques of classical ...
  • Paris Opera House (opera house, Paris, France)
    Parisian opera house designed by Charles Garnier. The building, considered one of the masterpieces of the Second Empire style, was begun in 1861 and opened with an orchestral concert on Jan. 5, 1875. The first opera performed there was Fromental Halévy’s work La Juive on Jan. 8, 1875. A second Parisian opera house, the Opéra Bastille, was inaugurated in 1989. Both opera...
  • Paris, Pact of (France-United States [1928])
    (Aug. 27, 1928), multilateral agreement attempting to eliminate war as an instrument of national policy. It was the most grandiose of a series of peacekeeping efforts after World War I....
  • Paris Parlement (court, France)
    The position originated in the ecclesiastical courts in the Middle Ages and was adopted by the Parlement of Paris in the late 13th century. Originally rapporteurs were not members of the court, but by 1336 they were given full rights to participate in the decision-making process as judges....
  • Paris Peace Accords (Vietnamese history)
    An agreement negotiated in January 1973 by the United States and North Vietnam at Paris called for a cease-fire in each of the countries of mainland Southeast Asia, but only in Laos was there peace. In February, just a month following the agreement, the Laotian factions signed the Vientiane Agreement, which provided again for a cease-fire and for yet another coalition government composed of......
  • Paris Peace Conference (1919–20)
    (1919–20), the meeting that inaugurated the international settlement after World War I....
  • Paris, Peace of (1783)
    (1783), collection of treaties concluding the American Revolution and signed by representatives of Great Britain on one side and the United States, France, and Spain on the other. Preliminary articles (often called the Preliminary Treaty of Paris) were signed at Paris between Britain and the United State...
  • Paris, Peace of (1796)
    The French campaign in Italy, which assured the political future of Napoleon Bonaparte, began in March 1796. According to the Peace of Paris (May 15, 1796), King Victor Amadeus III of Sardinia-Piedmont was forced to cede Savoy and Nice to France and to grant safe passage to the French armies. On the same day, Napoleon’s army drove the Austrians out of Milan, pursuing them into the territory...
  • Paris, Philippe d’Orléans, comte de (French pretender)
    pretender to the French throne after the death of Louis-Philippe (1850). The death of his father, Ferdinand, Duke d’Orléans, son and heir of King Louis-Philippe, in 1842 made the young Philippe heir to the throne and the candidate of the Orleanists. The title of Count de Paris was created for him....
  • paris, plaster of (building material)
    quick-setting gypsum plaster consisting of a fine, white powder, calcium sulfate hemihydrate (see calcium), which hardens when moistened and allowed to dry. Plaster of paris is prepared by heating calcium sulfate dihydrate, or gypsum, to 120°–180° C (248°–356° F). With an additive to retard th...
  • Paris Postal Conference (Europe-United States [1863])
    The first practical step toward reform did not come until May 1863, when the delegates of 15 European and American postal administrations met at the Paris Postal Conference, convening at the suggestion of the U.S. postmaster general. The conference established important general principles for the simplification of procedures, which were adopted as a model for subsequent bilateral treaties by......
  • Paris Psalter (religious manuscript)
    Two magnificent manuscripts of this period survive: the Paris Psalter and a book of sermons (Homilies of St. Gregory of Nazianzus), both in the Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris. The former contains 14 full-page miniatures in a grand, almost classical style, which led scholars at one time to date it to the earliest Byzantine period. The miniatures in the other book are more varied in......
  • Paris Review, The (American literary magazine)
    Two magnificent manuscripts of this period survive: the Paris Psalter and a book of sermons (Homilies of St. Gregory of Nazianzus), both in the Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris. The former contains 14 full-page miniatures in a grand, almost classical style, which led scholars at one time to date it to the earliest Byzantine period. The miniatures in the other book are more varied in.......
  • Paris, Siege of (1870-71)
    ...of war as well, he threw himself into the task of improvising military resistance. His task was complicated by the advance of the Prussian forces, which, by September 23, surrounded and besieged Paris. Gambetta shortly left the city by balloon to join several members of the government at Tours. During the next four months, Gambetta’s makeshift armies fought a series of indecisive battles...
  • Paris Stock Exchange (stock exchange, Paris, France)
    Share transactions in France were historically centred on the Bourse de Paris (Paris Stock Exchange), a national system that in the late 20th century incorporated much smaller exchanges at Lyon, Bordeaux, Lille, Marseille, Nancy, and Nantes. Share dealings and stock market activity increased greatly beginning in the early 1980s, corresponding with a period of deregulation and modernization:......
  • Paris Street; Rainy Day (painting by Caillebotte)
    ...urban environment, while The Parquet Floor Polishers (1875) is a realistic scene of urban craftsmen busily at work. Caillebotte’s masterpiece, Paris Street; Rainy Day (1877), uses bold perspective to create a monumental portrait of a Paris intersection on a rainy day. Caillebotte also painted portraits and figure studies, boating....
  • Paris Summit (international relations)
    ...The Chinese observer at a Warsaw Pact meeting in February 1960 declared in advance that any arms agreements reached at the U.S.–Soviet summit would not be binding on Peking. On the eve of the Paris summit an American U-2 spy plane was shot down over the U.S.S.R. When Eisenhower refused to apologize for the incident and assumed personal responsibility, Khrushchev had little choice but to....
  • Paris Symphonies (symphonies by Haydn)
    The late London and Paris Symphonies reflect the influence of Mozart and show Haydn at the height of his power. No two movements are alike; the “mosaic” of theme elements pervades even transition sections and codas; each instrument shares in the melodic development; minuets grow in fire or dignity while finales exploit varieties of rondo form (see below). His slow......
  • Paris, Treaties of (1919–1920)
    (1919–20), collectively the peace settlements concluding World War I and signed at sites around Paris. See Versailles, Treaty of (signed June 28, 1919); Saint-Germain, Treaty of (Sept. 10, 1919); Neuilly, Treaty of (Nov. 27, 1919); Trianon, Treaty of (June 4, 1920); and Sèvres, Treaty of...
  • Paris, Treaties of (1814-1815)
    (1814–15), two treaties signed at Paris respectively in 1814 and 1815 that ended the Napoleonic Wars. The treaty signed on May 30, 1814, was between France on the one side and the Allies (Austria, Great Britain, Prussia, Russia, Sweden, and Portugal) on the other. (Spain made the same treaty with France in July.) Napoleon had abdicated as France’s emperor in April,...
  • Paris, Treaty of (1661)
    ...frontier. Mazarin completed this settlement by arbitrating the “northern peace” (the treaties of Oliva and of Copenhagen on May 3 and May 27, 1660) and by returning Lorraine to its duke (Treaty of Paris, Feb. 28, 1661). Thus, at his death, the former diplomat of the Holy See could rejoice at having “returned peace to Christendom.” He would have liked to have seen Eur...
  • Paris, Treaty of (1898)
    (1898), treaty concluding the Spanish-American War. It was signed by representatives of Spain and the United States in Paris on Dec. 10, 1898 (see primary source document: Treaty of Paris)....
  • Paris, Treaty of (1327)
    ...do homage to Philip V’s brother and successor, Charles IV, an old issue relating to French rights in Saint-Sardos (in Agenais) flamed into a war that once again went in favour of the French. By the Treaty of Paris (March 1327) France recovered Agenais and Bazadais and imposed a heavy indemnity on England, but a number of issues were left unresolved. Meanwhile, having married the emperor ...
  • Paris, Treaty of (1947)
    By the Treaty of Paris (1947), made with the Allied Powers after World War II, Finland was permitted to maintain an army of 34,400 individuals, an air force of 3,000 individuals and 60 combat aircraft, and a navy of 4,500 individuals, with ships totaling 10,000 tons. The transformation of Russia, the EU, and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) at the end of the 20th century and the......
  • Paris, Treaty of (1951)
    ...is used to describe the type of treaty structure developed originally by six western European states: France, Germany, Italy, The Netherlands, Belgium, and Luxembourg. The first treaty was that of Paris, signed in 1951, establishing the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC); the second, the Rome treaty, signed in 1957, establishing the European Economic Community (EEC); the third, the Rome.....
  • Paris, Treaty of (1817)
    ...of Vienna: having assigned Parma to Napoleon’s estranged consort Marie-Louise for her lifetime, the Congress had to find some alternative compensation for the still-dispossessed Bourbons. The Treaty of Paris of 1817, however, prescribed that on Marie-Louise’s death Parma should revert to the Bourbons, who in 1847 renounced Lucca to the Habsburgs of Tuscany nine weeks before succee...
  • Paris, Treaty of (1814)
    ...early in 1814, after the allies had launched their invasion of France. In the course of the spring, the capture of Paris, the restoration of the Bourbons, and the conclusion of peace in the first Treaty of Paris (May 30) ended the Wars of Liberation except for the episode of the Hundred Days, when Napoleon briefly returned to power and was ultimately beaten at Waterloo. The western frontier......
  • Paris, Treaty of (1946)
    ...(southern Tirol; now part of the Italian Trentino–Alto Adige region) and the problem of association with the European Economic Community (EEC; later renamed the European Community). During the Paris Peace Conference of 1946, an agreement had been signed guaranteeing the rights of the German-speaking population of Südtirol, a region that Italy had obtained after World War I. The......
  • Paris, Treaty of (1763)
    (1763), treaty concluding the Franco-British conflicts of the Seven Years’ War (called the French and Indian War in North America) and signed by representatives of Great Britain and Hanover on one side and France and Spain on the other, with Portugal expressly understood to be i...
  • Paris, Treaty of (1815)
    ...rule was quickly ended by a Russo-Turkish force (1798–99). Reclaimed by France in 1807 and made an integral part of the French empire under Napoleon, the islands were placed by the Treaty of Paris (1815) under the exclusive protection of Great Britain....
  • Paris, Treaty of (1229)
    ...the Albigensian Crusade, which threw the whole of the nobility of the north of France against that of the south and destroyed the brilliant Provençal civilization, ended, politically, in the Treaty of Paris (1229), which destroyed the independence of the princes of the south but did not extinguish the heresy, in spite of the wholesale massacres of heretics during the war. The......
  • Paris, Treaty of (1259)
    ...proved impossible, and this was one of the causes for the outbreak of the French war in 1337. Another was the long-standing friction over Gascony, chronic since 1294 and stemming ultimately from the Treaty of Paris of 1259. By establishing that the kings of England owed homage to the kings of France for Gascony the treaty had created an awkward relationship. The building of bastides (fortified....
  • Paris, Treaty of (1783)
    (1783), treaty between Great Britain and the United States concluding the American Revolution. See Paris, Peace of....
  • Paris, Treaty of (1856)
    (1856), treaty signed on March 30, 1856, in Paris that ended the Crimean War. The treaty was signed between Russia on one side and France, Great Britain, Sardinia-Piedmont, and Turkey on the other. Because the western European powers had fought the war to protect Ottoman Turkey from Russia, the treaty gave special attention to this problem. The signatories guaranteed the independence and territori...
  • Paris, Treaty of (1404)
    ...eldest son of Charles II the Bad. Unlike his father, he pursued a consistent policy of peace both with Castile (which in gratitude restored certain districts to Navarre) and with France. By the treaty of Paris (1404) Charles not only renounced the Navarrese claims to Champagne but also ceded Cherbourg (which he had recovered from the English in 1393) and the countship of Évreux to......
  • Paris, University of (university, Paris, France)
    universities founded in 1970 under France’s 1968 Orientation Act, reforming higher education. They replaced the former University of Paris, one of the archetypal European universities, founded about 1170....
  • Paris ware (pottery)
    faience (tin-glazed earthenware) and porcelain ware produced in the Paris region from the 16th century. The hard-paste–porcelain industry in Paris owed its existence to a breach in the Sèvres porcelain monopoly after 1766. The major factories were under the protection or ownership of high-ranking noblemen, just as Sèvres was under that of the king. They are known by the names...
  • Paris-Match (French magazine)
    weekly pictorial magazine published in France since 1949 as successor to L’Illustration (1843–1944), which was discredited during World War II. A popular pictorial-news and current-events magazine aimed at the middle class, it features picture stories on public affairs, profiles and interviews of government officials and assorted celebrities, and stories on entertainment, fas...
  • paris-mutuels (gambling system)
    method of wagering introduced in France about 1870 by Parisian businessman Pierre Oller. It became one of the world’s most popular methods of betting on horse races....
  • Parise, Goffredo (Italian author)
    ...the Snow]). By contrast, there were humorous recollections of provincial life under fascism—for example, Mario Tobino’s Bandiera nera (1950; “Black Flag”) and Goffredo Parise’s Prete bello (1954; “The Handsome Priest”; Eng. trans. The Priest Among the Pigeons). In contrast to the more topical ap...
  • parish (Louisiana government)
    Local self-government in Louisiana followed the Virginia system of county government. The parish (county), the municipality, and the special district are the units of local government. There are 64 parishes, with land areas that vary from roughly 180 square miles (466 square km) in Orleans parish near the city of New Orleans to more than 1,300 square miles (3,370 square km) in Cameron parish in......
  • parish (religion)
    in some Christian church polities, a geographic unit served by a pastor or priest. It is a subdivision of a diocese....
  • parish (British government unit)
    ...government, each with its own responsibilities, whereas other areas have only a single tier or two tiers. Throughout England, parish and town councils form the lowest tier of local government. (Parishes are civil subdivisions, usually centred on a village or small town, that are distinct from church bodies.) They have the power to assess “precepts” (surcharges) on the local......
  • parish constable (British official)
    A chief or high constable in every local area (hundred or franchise) was responsible for suppressing riots and violent crimes and for arming the militia to enable him to do so. Under him were petty constables in each tithing, or village. The high and petty, or parish, constables remained the executive legal officers in counties until the County Police Acts of 1839 and 1840 allowed certain......
  • parish library
    There were, of course, other developments. In England there were established a number of parish libraries, attached to churches and chiefly intended for the use of the clergy (one of the earliest, at Grantham in Lincolnshire, was set up as early as 1598, and some of its original chained books are still to be seen there). They were sometimes the result of lay donation: a Manchester merchant,......
  • Parish Register, The (work by Crabbe)
    In 1807, however, spurred by the increasing expenses associated with his sons’ education, Crabbe began to publish again. He reprinted his poems, together with a new work, “The Parish Register,” in which he made use of the register of births, deaths, and marriages to create a compassionate depiction of the life of a rural community. Other verse tales followed, including The....
  • Parish, Sister (American interior designer)
    (DOROTHY MAY KINNICUTT), U.S. interior designer (b. July 15, 1910, Morristown, N.J.--d. Sept. 8, 1994, Dark Harbor, Maine), created ageless atmospheres that appealed to both women and men and dictated style on both sides of the Atlantic with her traditional designs; she was renowned for the quality of her work, and her homey yet sophisticated touch marked the residences of such industrialists and ...
  • parishad (ancient Indian assembly)
    ...functioned with the assistance of a council of elders probably selected from the Kshatriya families. The most important institution was the sovereign general assembly, or parishad, to the meetings of which members were summoned by kettledrum. Precise rules governed the seating arrangement, the agenda, and the order of speaking and debate, which terminated.....
  • “Parisian Prowler, The” (work by Baudelaire)
    Baudelaire’s Petits poèmes en prose was published posthumously in 1869 and was later, as intended by the author, entitled Le Spleen de Paris (translated as The Parisian Prowler). He did not live long enough to bring these poems together in a single volume, but it is clear from his correspondence that the work he envisaged was both a continuation...
  • Parisian school (music)
    during the late 12th and early 13th centuries, an important group of composers and singers working under the patronage of the great Cathedral of Notre-Dame in Paris. The Notre-Dame school is important to the history of music because it produced the earliest repertory of polyphonic (multipart) music to gain international prestige and circulation. Its four major forms are ...
  • Parisien, Le (French newspaper)
    morning daily newspaper published in Paris, one of the largest and most influential in France. Formerly called Le Parisien Libéré (“The Free Parisian”), it was established in Paris in 1944 as an organ of the French underground during the latter part of the German occupation in World War II. The paper used a sensational ma...
  • “Parisien Libéré, Le” (French newspaper)
    morning daily newspaper published in Paris, one of the largest and most influential in France. Formerly called Le Parisien Libéré (“The Free Parisian”), it was established in Paris in 1944 as an organ of the French underground during the latter part of the German occupation in World War II. The paper used a sensational ma...
  • Parisienne, La (work by Becque)
    ...for an inheritance. The unvaried egotism of the characters and the realistic dialogue were unfavourably received, except by the Naturalist critics, and the play had only three performances. La Parisienne (1885; Parisienne, 1943) scandalized the public by its treatment of the story of a married woman and her two lovers. Its importance, like that of Les Corbeaux, was not......
  • Parisiensus, Johannes (French artist)
    painter, architect, and sculptor, the most important portrait painter in France at the beginning of the 16th century....
  • Parisii (people)
    ...now the city of Paris dates from about 7600 bc. By the end of the 3rd century bc, a settlement had been built on the Île de la Cité; it was inhabited by a Gallic tribe known as the Parisii. The first recorded name for the settlement was Lutetia (Latin: “Midwater-Dwelling”). When the Romans arrived, the Parisii were sufficiently organized a...
  • Parisina’s Sleep (painting by Brown)
    ...dramatic feeling suited to the Byronic subjects that he painted in Paris during 1840–43, such as Manfred on the Jungfrau (c. 1840) and Parisina’s Sleep (1842). Already concerned with the accurate representation of natural phenomena, he drew from corpses in University College Hospital in London when painting his ......
  • parison (technology)
    ...containers for products previously marketed in glass is due in no small part to the development of blow molding. In this technique, illustrated in Figure 4, a thermoplastic hollow tube, the parison, is formed by injection molding or extrusion. In heated form, the tube is sealed at one end and then blown up like a balloon. The expansion is carried out in a split mold with a cold surface;......
  • paritta (Buddhist text)
    ...are intended to protect against various kinds of danger and to exorcise evil influences. In the Theravada tradition, these rituals are closely associated with texts called parittas, many of which are attributed directly to the Buddha. In Sri Lanka and the Theravada countries of Southeast Asia, parittas are traditionally.....
  • parity (mathematics)
    ...is prime; therefore, 7 × 4 = 28 (“the sum multiplied into the last”) is a perfect number. Euclid’s formula forces any perfect number obtained from it to be even, and in the 18th century the Swiss mathematician Leonhard Euler showed that any even perfect number must be obtainable from Euclid’s formula. It is not known whether there a...
  • parity (economics)
    in economics, equality in price, rate of exchange, purchasing power, or wages....
  • parity (particle physics)
    in physics, property important in the quantum-mechanical description of a physical system. In most cases it relates to the symmetry of the wave function representing a system of fundamental particles. A parity transformation replaces such a system with a type of mirror image. Stated mathematically, the spatial coordinates describing the system are inverted thr...
  • Parity Amendment (Filipino history)
    ...at a rate of 2:1, and provided for free trade between the two countries for 8 years, to be followed by gradual application of tariffs for the next 20 years. Many Filipinos objected to the so-called Parity Amendment, which required an amendment to the Philippine constitution allowing U.S. citizens equal rights with Filipinos in the exploitation of natural resources and operation of public......
  • parity check (information theory)
    A common type of error-detecting code is the parity code, which adds one bit to a block of bits so that the ones in the block always add up to either an odd or even number. For example, an odd parity code might replace the two-bit code words 00, 01, 10, and 11 with the three-bit words 001, 010, 100, and 111. Any single transformation of a 0 to a 1 or a 1 to a 0 would change the parity of the......
  • parity, conservation of (physics)
    Until 1956 it was assumed that, when an isolated system of fundamental particles interacts, the overall parity remains the same or is conserved. This conservation of parity implied that, for fundamental physical interactions, it is impossible to distinguish right from left and clockwise from counterclockwise. The laws of physics, it was thought, are indifferent to mirror reflection and could......
  • Parivāra (Buddhist text)
    3. Parivāra (“Appendix”), a classified digest of the rules in the other Vinaya texts, apparently confined to the Theravāda school. ...
  • parivincular ligament (mollusk anatomy)
    ...groups of bivalves. Middorsally an elastic ligament creates the opening thrust that operates against the closing action of the adductor muscles. The ligament typically develops either externally (parivincular) or internally (alivincular) but comprises outer lamellar, and inner fibrous, layers secreted by the mantle crest. The ligament type is generally characteristic of each bivalve group.......
  • Pariz un Viene (work by Levita)
    ...in 1541; “The Book of Bove”), based on an Italian version of an Anglo-Norman tale about a queen who betrays her husband and causes his death. He may also have written Pariz un Viene (printed in 1594; “Paris and Vienna”), about a poor knight seeking to marry a princess....
  • Parizeau, Jacques (Canadian politician)
    The Parti Québécois won 77 out of 125 seats in the 1994 provincial election and formed a government under its leader, Jacques Parizeau. In 1995 the party held another referendum seeking popular approval to negotiate Quebec’s secession from Canada; again the proposal was rejected, though this time it lost by only 1 percent of the vote. Lucien Bouchard, the leader of the federal...
  • Parjī language
    In extreme northern Andhra Pradesh and in Mahārāshtra, the Kolāmī language is spoken by approximately 84,000 individuals. Parjī is spoken by about 36,000 individuals in Andhra Pradesh and Orissa. The Konda Dora, a scheduled tribe of some 23,000, live mostly in Andhra Pradesh and speak Koṇḍa. The Gadbā, who live mainly in Andhra Pradesh, numbe...
  • park
    large area of ground set aside for recreation. The earliest parks were those of the Persian kings, who dedicated many square miles to the sport of hunting; by natural progression such reserves became artificially shaped by the creation of riding paths and shelters until the decorative possibilities became an inherent part of their character. A second type of park derived from such open-air public ...
  • Park Chung Hee (president of South Korea)
    South Korean general and politician, president of the Republic of Korea (South Korea) from 1963 to his death. His 18-year rule brought about enormous economic expansion at the cost of civil liberties and political freedom....
  • Park City (Utah, United States)
    city, Summit county, northern Utah, U.S. Founded in 1869 as a mining district in the valley between the Wasatch Range and the Uinta Plateau some 30 miles (48 km) southeast of Salt Lake City, the small city enjoyed several booms throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries but faltered during the Depression. In the 1950s local developers rema...
  • Park Forest (Illinois, United States)
    village, Cook and Will counties, northeastern Illinois, U.S. It is a residential suburb of Chicago, lying about 30 miles (50 km) south of the city. Developed as a planned community after World War II, Park Forest attracted widespread interest because its planners assumed responsibility for all phases of community development. It was designed by Elbert Peets fo...
  • Park, Keith (British officer)
    ...1940–April 1941) was to defend England’s Midlands against German air attacks. A debate over tactics during the battle brought Leigh-Mallory into conflict with the Number 11 Group commander, Keith Park (in charge of defending southern England), and with the head of Fighter Command, Hugh Dowding. In defending Britain against German air attacks, these two commanders stressed the time...
  • Park Kyung-ni (South Korean poet and novelist)
    South Korean poet and novelist who garnered international acclaim for the 21-volume epic novel T’oji (1969–94; Land), in which she chronicled Korea’s tumultuous history from 1897 to 1945. The novel, widely regarded as a masterpiece of Korean literature, took Pak more than 25 years to complete and won numerous honours, including the Woltan Literature Award. Pak pu...
  • Park, Maud Wood (American suffragist)
    American suffragist whose lobbying skills and grasp of legislative politics were successfully deployed on behalf of woman suffrage and welfare issues involving women and children....
  • Park, Mungo (Scottish explorer)
    Scottish explorer of the Niger....
  • park, national
    an area set aside by a national government for the preservation of the natural environment. A national park may be set aside for purposes of public recreation and enjoyment or because of its historical or scientific interest. Most of the landscapes and their accompanying plants and animals in a national park are kept in their natural state. The national parks in the United States...
  • Park, Nicholas Wulstan (British animator, writer, producer, and director)
    British animator and director of stop-motion films that often feature his characters Wallace and Gromit....
  • Park, Nick (British animator, writer, producer, and director)
    British animator and director of stop-motion films that often feature his characters Wallace and Gromit....
  • Park, Orlando (American etomologist)
    U.S. entomologist known chiefly for his work on the biology and taxonomy of insects comprising the family Pselaphidae, a group of small, short-winged, mold beetles that commonly live in ant nests....
  • Park Range (mountains, Colorado-Wyoming, United States)
    segment of the Rocky Mountains, extending south-southeastward for about 200 miles (320 km) from Carbon county, Wyo., to northwestern Park county, Colo., U.S. The range lies to a large extent within Medicine Bow, Pike, Arapaho, Routt, and White River national forests and includes the Mosquito (Colorado), Gore (Colorado), and Sierra Madre (Wyoming) subranges. Many peaks surpass 14,000 feet (4,300 m...
  • park ranger (park management)
    In the National Park Service, the U.S. Department of the Interior established in 1916 a force of national-park rangers whose functions were protection and conservation of forests and wildlife, enforcement of park regulations (for which they have police power), and assistance to visitors. Similar functions with respect to the national forests were assigned to the rangers of the Forest Service,......
  • Park Ridge (Illinois, United States)
    city, Cook county, northeastern Illinois, U.S. A suburb of Chicago, it lies on the Des Plaines River, 17 miles (27 km) northwest of downtown. The area was first inhabited by Potawatomi Indians and used by French explorers as a portage. The site was settled in the early 1830s. In 1853 George Penny founded a brickyard there,...
  • Park, Robert E. (American sociologist)
    American sociologist noted for his work on ethnic minority groups, particularly African Americans, and on human ecology, a term he is credited with coining. One of the leading figures in what came to be known as the “Chicago school” of sociology, he initiated a great deal of fieldwork in Chicago that explored race relations, migration, ethnic relations, social move...
  • Park, Robert Ezra (American sociologist)
    American sociologist noted for his work on ethnic minority groups, particularly African Americans, and on human ecology, a term he is credited with coining. One of the leading figures in what came to be known as the “Chicago school” of sociology, he initiated a great deal of fieldwork in Chicago that explored race relations, migration, ethnic relations, social move...
  • Park Street Church (church, Boston, Massachusetts, United States)
    ...an attic, a simple, slim, white spire, as in the Old South Meeting House, Boston (1729). This trend toward slender and attenuated proportions reached its climax in the exquisitely light spire of Park Street Church, Boston (1819), by Peter Banner....
  • Park, Thomas (American animal ecologist)
    U.S. animal ecologist known for his experiments with beetles in analyzing population dynamics....
  • parka (clothing)
    hip-length, hooded jacket traditionally made of caribou, seal, or other fur, worn as an outer garment by Arctic peoples....
  • Parker, Alton B. (United States jurist)
    American jurist and Democratic presidential nominee in 1904, defeated by the incumbent, Theodore Roosevelt....
  • Parker, Alton Brooks (United States jurist)
    American jurist and Democratic presidential nominee in 1904, defeated by the incumbent, Theodore Roosevelt....
  • Parker, Bonnie (American criminal)
    Barrow had been a criminal long before he met Parker in January 1930. After 20 months in prison in 1930–32, he teamed up with Parker, and the two began a crime spree that lasted 21 months. Often working with confederates—including Barrow’s brother Buck and Buck’s wife, Blanche, as well as Ray Hamilton and W.D. Jones—Bonnie and Clyde, as they were popularly known,...
  • Parker Bowles, Camilla (British duchess)
    consort (2005– ) of Charles, prince of Wales....
  • Parker Brothers (American company)
    ...best-selling privately patented board game in history, gained popularity in the United States during the Great Depression when Charles B. Darrow, an unemployed heating engineer, sold the concept to Parker Brothers in 1935. Before then, homemade versions of a similar game had circulated in many parts of the United States. Most were based on the Landlord’s Game, a board game designed and p...
  • Parker, Cecilia Ann Renee (American model)
    American model and actress (b. Oct. 28, 1933, Long Island City, N.Y.—d. May 3, 2003, Montecito, Calif.), had a beauty and sophistication that led to her paving the way for future supermodels by becoming the first model to make more than $100 an hour and $100,000 a year. She later had a short career as an actress in movies and on television....
  • Parker, Charles Christopher, Jr. (American musician)
    American alto saxophonist, composer, and bandleader, a lyric artist generally considered the greatest jazz saxophonist. Parker was the principal stimulus of the modern jazz idiom known as bebop, and—together with Louis Armstrong and Ornette Coleman—he was one of the three great revolutionary geniuses in jazz. (Click here for a ...
Skip this Advertisement

Link to this article and share the full text with the readers of your Web site or blog-post.

If you think a reference to this article on "" will enhance your Web site, blog-post, or any other web-content, then feel free to link to this article, and your readers will gain full access to the full article, even if they do not subscribe to our service.

You may want to use the HTML code fragment provided below.

copy link

We welcome your comments. Any revisions or updates suggested for this article will be reviewed by our editorial staff. Contact us here.

Regular users of Britannica may notice that this comments feature is less robust than in the past. This is only temporary, while we make the transition to a dramatically new and richer site. The functionality of the system will be restored soon.

The Britannica Store
A-Z Browse

Image preview